That time when you should have listened to your bestfriend
by otomezone
Summary: Haruka knew from before that he should always listen to Makoto. His bestfriend strangely always knew the right things to say at the right time. And Haruka always wondered why he never really listened to him. Until he ended up in the Meiji era. [Time Travel AU]


Haruka knew from before that he should always listen to Makoto. His bestfriend strangely always knew the right things to say at the right time. And Haruka always wondered why he never really listened to him.

He sighs as he shifts the worn out yukata he's wearing. The old thing was dirty and had a bunch of holes but he was still grateful for the discarded fabric he saw at the side of the road. So what if it was worn by some random person, Haruka at least had the decency to have some clothes on. He wouldn't want to go around wearing just his jammers after all. Even though the yukata was indeed smelly and tattered, at least, those dark marks around it aren't blood (or so he hopes).

Makoto had told him not to swim at that lake. He'd yelled and whined but Haruka, as always, decided to ignore him and take a dip in the lake anyway. No way would have he known he'd end up in Imperial Japan after. Well, he did try swimming back, heck he even tried to swim different strokes (gasp!), but none of his methods worked and he decided to move instead of just moping away at the side of the lake.

Haru walks anyway, without a care in the world (though he'd probably give up his left kidney for some better clothes, because really he had to part with that yukata). He somehow ends up in a more populated district, and despite showing a calm face, the looks people were giving him were actually making him really nervous (no actually, the whole time travelling thing already made him nervous).

'How can I go back…' he thinks as he walks along the road. He wonders, can he go back to his friends? To his family? To the pool? To mackerel? And the last thought hits him like a ten wheeler truck. Where will he be able to get his mackerel fix in this land? The horror makes him pause for a minute.

Then, suddenly, a familiar smell fills his nose. This is the smell he's used to, the smell he's always known, the smell he's surrounded with every night and day. Mackerel. And it almost smells like its burning.

With a burst of adrenaline, Haru rushes to the origin of the smell as fast as his slipper-less feet could carry him. Sweat beads at his forehead and his feet is sore but he can see it, a faint grey cloud of smoke. He quickens his pace and finally sees the small restaurant.

"Irrashaimase! Ugh…" The vendor fanning the grill moves away in disgust as he comes closer, but he doesn't care. There's some mackerel to save. In a swift movement he turns the mackerel to its other side, and despite the vendors protests to get him away, he stares at the grilling fish for a minute or two before fetching a plate off a customers table and promptly putting the now perfectly grilled fish there.

He surveys his work and smiles to himself, unaware of the commotion he's caused. Until a white gloved hand makes its way onto his shoulder.

"Oi." He looks up to a disgruntled red haired man. 'Rin!?' Haruka thinks as his eyes widen in recognition. But the former doesn't seem to recognize him and Haruka frowns. Upon closer inspection, he's wearing a black button up suit that strangely looks like one from those history classes… and then it clicks.

"Ah." Haruka says.

"Don't you 'Ah' me! You're arrested for disturbing public peace!" The officer says as he forcefully drags Haruka out of the establishment.

"Rin, what's taking you so long." Another officer on a horse says and Haruka recognizes him as Yamazaki. It's somehow not all that strange that these two ended up being together despite a hundred years in the past.

"Just had some trouble down the path." Rin says as he binds Haruka to a rope attached to his horse. Despite being awed at how amazing this all is, (specially the horses because wow, horses), he's not thrilled to be walking his way down to the jailhouse.

When they arrive at the jailhouse, he's immediately bound to a post and interrogated. Oh, he never wanted to go back to history class as much as now.

"Oi, speak up. Who are you and what were you doing at that restaurant?" Officer Rin tries to intimidate but Haru just sighs. Rin's nerves pop out at the ignorance and he continues to shout.

"Hey, why aren't you speaking?" Officer Sousuke says as he forces Haruka to look at him. Haruka side eyes him and replies, "I'm exercising my right to remain silent as anything I say may be taken against me."

Rin's eyes widen and Sousuke stifles a laugh.

"Now now, I thought you were just some random beggar, but it seems like you're more to that." Rin smirks, "Tell me why are you wearing those clothes."

Thinking that it's not really harmful to answer that, Haruka tells him the truth. "Because I have nothing else to wear."

Rin furrows his eyebrow and Sousuke giggles in the background.

"What do you mean by that?"

"I really have nothing else to wear. I just picked this off the side of the road."

Rin frowns. The guy has a clean face and his feet aren't that bruised, like he just walked barefoot for a few hours, he can't have been a beggar. So was he mugged on the road? Or is he trying to fool us?

"Why would you wear something you picked off from the road?" Rin asks.

"Because I have nothing to wear."

Sousuke giggles again despite Rin and Haruka trying to be serious.

"Then what were you wearing before that? Did you get robbed? You know you should report to us if you've gotten rob—"

"Jammers."

Rin looks at the man. "What?"

"My jammers. I was wearing my jammers. For swimming."

Rin and Sousuke exchange looks. And Haruka, sensing their confusion tries to shift his hips.

"W-what are you doing!" Rin says startled at their captives' actions.

"I'm trying to show you what jammers are, but unfortunately my hands are tied. Look inside the yukata." Haru instructs them, face as stoic as ever.

Rin on the other hand has his face flushed while Sousuke full on bursts out laughing. "A-are you telling us to look at your undergarments!"

Haruka can't really say anything because, no they aren't undergarments, and yes well basically they are kind of like under garments. But no, still no, they were swimwear. And so Haruka just nods his head.

Rin doesn't know what came over him, his face is a red tomato and Sousuke is too, but that was because he was laughing too hard. Rin's hand is almost touching the edge of Haruka's yukata when reason came back to him.

"Why would I want to look at you're undergarments!" Rin exclaims, looking straight at Haruka, face flushed in confusion.

Haruka simply shuffles his leg, revealing a mysterious black fabric (or was that skin?) underneath. "These are jammers. They're swimwear. They're not undergarments."

Rin finally pushes the Yukata away to reveal more of the swimsuit. It was black, almost upto the knees and had purple stripes. Rin and Sousuke (who had finally stopped laughing), were looking so intently at his jammers (no, not his lower regions) that Haruka was embarrassed a little.

Suddenly, Rin looks up to him, cheeks pink in amazement. "Hey, can I touch this?" and Haruka doesn't know how to respond to that. Meanwhile, Sousuke asks, "What's swimwear?" and Haruka just sighs.

Haruka, after figuring out that those two puppies of the Japanese imperial police won't harm him, he decided to put it all to luck and told them about his situation. That only a few hours ago he was in the 21st century and now all of a sudden he's stuck in the Meiji era. Sousuke looks like he doesn't really believe, but Rin's face is pink in wonder and amazement and Haruka can't help but think 'Wow, how gullible.' And he smiles. 'Just like the kid Rin.'

Haruka stays some two more days in the prison due to the lack of a benefactor (and clear identity even), with Rin visiting him frequently asking him tons of questions about the future. Haruka's careful not too divulge too much like war and stuff, but more on other things like sports and swimming and pools and water.

Rin laughs timidly, "How can swimming in water be competitive?"

"If you try, I know you'll love it."

"Hey! Don't look down on me! I did swim on a tournament before!"

"A tournament?"

"Yeah, you swim sideways with armor on, it was super exhilarating! I almost won first place!"

Haruka side-eyes, remembering that one competition in Coach Sasabe's swimming class with similar sideways swimming with armor. It didn't look fun in the slightest.

"When I get out of here, I'll teach you how to swim. I'm sure you'll swim fast." 'Maybe even faster than me… sometimes.'

Rin's eyes widen in delight, as if there were stars, and his cheeks are tinted pink again. He's always like this with Haruka, and the dark haired boy can't help but smile.

The next day, Haruka is permitted to leave the jail. It seems like the owner of the restaurant he'd caused trouble at bailed him out. He told him that they can't quite reproduce the perfectly grilled mackerel Haruka made that one time and actually offered him a job. Haruka accepted with some extra haggling (more like free mackerel breakfast, lunch and dinner) and he was officially out of the jailhouse.

Problem is, that he doesn't really have a place to go.

Sensing his dilemma, the red haired officer winds an arm around his shoulder. "Hey, if you don't have any place to crash, you're always welcome at my place."

Haruka smiles at him. "I'll think about that offer."

.

.

He still wants to go back. To his friends, to his family, to the pool. But for now, he thinks, as he snuggles into a certain red hair's neck, he's fine with Imperial Japan.

(Besides, mackerel breakfast, lunch and dinner for free.)

.

A/N: Cross-posted from AO3, for RinHaruweek day 1 :) Thank you for reading! Comments are appreciated :D


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